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Uft NATION'S REFUGE-THE CHAMBER OF 
SOLEMN REFLECTION. 



A S E R M N , 

DELIVERED IN THK 

J^QRMED DUTCH CHURCH OF MIDDLEBURO.ff, 

JULY 14, 1850, 

• N THK 



I 

T3y Rev. J. WEST, 

PASTOR (If SKID CIU7KCW. 



i.'HOUARIE 



OUR NATION'S REFUGE-THE CHAMBER OF 
SOLEMN REFLECTION. 



A SERMON, 

DELIVERED IN THE 

DUTCH REFORMED CHURCH OF MIDDLEBURG: 
JULY 14, 1850, 

ON THE 
OCC fcglON OF THE 

DEATH OF IkCILffiY TAYLOR, 

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 



By Rev. J. WEST, 

PASTOR OF SAID CHURCH. 



PRINTED AT THE PATRIOT OFFICE, 
SCHOHARIE C. H, 



fu 



Wf 



Convention at Larg 

For Delegates at Large to the Con- 
stitutional Convention. 
Augustus Schell, 
George Law, 
Henry C. Murphy, 
Homer A. Nelson, 
David L. Seymour, 
Jacob H. Harden burg, , 

Smith M. Weed, 
Alonzo C. Paige, 
Francis Kernan, 
George F. Comstock, 
John Magee, 
Henry D. Barto, 
Isaac Butts, 
Henry 0. Chesebro, 
Joseph G. Masten, 
Marshall B. Champlain. 



4 



For Se.Dervtsor 
Alexander Bouck 

For Juetioo of tlie Pence 

Montraville Gernsey 

For Town Clerk 

Oscar Pierson 

For Overseers of tho Poor 

Edmond D Atchinson 

George L Bouck 

For Commissioner of Highway* 

Stephen Webb 
For Collector 
Junn Fox 

For Assessors 

David R Hyde, Full Term 
James Barber, to fill vacancy 

For Inspectors ol Election 
Dist. No. 1— John B Kniffiu 
John W Pindar 
Dist. No. 2— Archibald Macomber 
John C Shufelt 
For ConbtabWa 
Charles L Miller 
Cornell Palmer 
William H Lawyer 
John J Nasholds 
John Benedict 
For Sealer of Weights and Measure* 
Ebenezer Brayman 
Town House at 
A J F re em vers 






MIDDLEBURGH. JULY 17. 18-50. 

. ; ;d Bkau Sir : . 

We the undersigned, having listened with great pleasure and interest to 
ne Sermon you preached on Sabbath morning, July 14, on the occasion of the death 
5 President Taylor, and believing its publication will be calculated to do good by 
perpetuating and disseminating the sound, sensible and practical views contained 
therein, would respectfully and earnestly request that you would favor us with the 
manuscript of your discourse for the press. We trust you will not withhold it m 
consequence of the short lime allowed you for its preparation. 
Respectfully, yours, &c. 

H BECKER E. SANFORD, 

P Z SWART, PETFR S. DANFORTH, 

G E DANFORTH, Wm. H. ENGLE, 

G S' STANTON, E. D. ATCHINSON, 

h' b' JONFS V. DANFORTH. 

D B' DANFORTH, A. L. RUSHMORE, 

r'. MANNING, J- M. SCRIBNER. 

To Rr.v. J. West. 



Gentlemen : 

Your note, requesting a copy of the Sermon delivered by me on the occasion 
ol the death of President Taylor, is received. The pressure of labor and exhaus- 
tion under which it was prepared, must necessarily leave it imperfect both in de- 
sign and execution. Without the remotest thought that it would be s ed for pub- 
lication, it must fail in a great degree in adaptation to the design int. .ed. But a 
request thus endorsed, and for such reasons, I do not feel at liberty to decline. 
A copy is therefore, placed at your disposal. 

Truly yours, 

J. WEST. 

To H. Becker, P. Z. Swart, L. Sanforp ; P. S. Danforth, and others. 

Middkburgh, August 1, 1S00. 



deepest penitence before (he Great Ruler of the world, depre- 
cating our sins and craving the mercy which we have so lung 
and so much abused. 

Had Zachary T :ly as a private individual, 

we would liave sympathised with i family, and re- 

ceived a lesson which the providence of God always inculcates 
in such an event. Had lie died as the commander of an army, 
as the leader of his country's hosts, we would have mourned 
the fail of one who had won for himself an imperishable fame 
by the victories he had achieved and the ueed$>-6i" valor he had 
pei formed. But dying as th : Executive of the nation — 

as the President of these United States, and at such a crisis in 
her history, with v. hat word; c- give expression to our 

sorrow! En this darkest hour that has ever gathered in im- 
penetrable blackness over our beloved Republic — to loose 
such a man! who can foretell the consequences ? Well may 
twenty millions of our countrymen, gather this day Into their 
respective places of worship with broken hearts, and bow 
down before the God of the whole earth, and pour out there 
souls in earnest supplication, that bis protecting and fostering 
care may not be.wilhdrawn from our National Government — 
to defend it from destruction, and to >. 
as dear as life and light to every A 
penetrable, inscrutibl 

overwhelmed, by its suddenness, and by the awful and irrepar- 
able breach which it has caused ! We dare not ask, why is it 
thus? We have not the power to determine where its conse- 
quences will end. But from it, a voice falls like the light of 
the morning sun upon the length and breadth of this land, and. 
says to every individual in it : " Com?, my people, enter ihou in- 
to thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee : hide thyself as 
it were for a little moment, until the indignation he overpast." 
Upon these boisterous, angry councils — upon these distracted, 
bigoted parties — upon those self-sufficient, grasping plans — up- 
on a Nation that had sunk down in apathy and indifference in 
regard to the moral and political eviis that abounded, God has 
let go the messenger of his judgments, and the one concerning 
whom we feared the least, and in whom the highest hopes and 
affections were centered, is removed at a single stroke. 

A calamity ? Of this there is probably not a single doubt in 
the Nation ; and a calamity, the bitter end of which, we can- 
not by any human penetration foresee. Can any thing be done 
to avert it ? To keep from us those fearful eviis, from the bare 
contemplation of which the mind shrinks back agasl ? Yes, 
there is a hope. Obey the voice of God m the calamity. " En- 



ier into thy chambers and shut thy doors ribout lliee, and | 
thyself, as it were for a little moment, until the rndignation be 

overp ist." The figure of the text is a most striking arid im- 
pressive illustration of the sorrowful event that has railed us 
together this morning. .' .. h, when the foundations of 

the great deep were to be broken up, and earth's guilty races 
were to perish by the judgments of God ; as he gathered his 
household around him and entered into his chambers;, and shut 
his doors about him, and give himself up entirely to the wiil of 
Him who rules in heaven and earth, and cast himself upon His 
mercy for protection and defence. What must have been his 
reflections as he sat in these chambers and heard the shriek of 
a world as it perished, and felt that wild waste of waters bear- 
ing him aloft, as he rode those mountain billows, as a forest or 
a city in its destruction came rushing past through the impen- 
etrable gloom, as the v and howled, and " the 
foundations of the c of course?" What must 
have been his views of the character ol'God — of his perfections, 
of his glorious holiness? With what contrition and awe did 
hoTegard sirr, that " brought death into the world with all our 
woeV' and reaped su ' a feai ful harvest in the universal wreck 
that reigned Or like the Israelite in Egypt, as he 
sprinkled the lin poll of his door with the blood of the 
>b, betokening that fearful visit from the Angel of 
Deal!), who in the solemn hour of midnight was to sweep over 
the land and deluge it with mourning and tears, by destruction 
of the first born in every house. With what solemn awe, did 
those households gather together in their chambers, and shut 
the doors about them, while that awful scourge was passing 
over them ! With what feelings did they hear the lamenta- 
tions and wailings of those that dwelt next to them, as the first- 
born was suddenly smitten by an invisible hand, and yielded 
his life a prey ! Wit!) what contrite penitence did they regard 
that Paschal lamb that lay there slain for them — the pledge of 
their present protection and the presage of their future hopes, 
through the mercy of God in Christ ? How awfully near did 
those solemn gatherings together — those momentous events, 
bring them to that Great Being, whose power they saw display- 
ed and whoso attributes they saw proclaimed in thrilling tones 
in the Providences by which they were surrounded ! 

So should we, whose first-born God has taken, and over 
-whom the cup of his indignation seems ready to be poured out, 
also enter into our chambers and bhut the doors about us, and 
solemnly consider of what has beet) done, and the probable re- 
sults which wc are to experience hereafter. That chamber 
should witness tears of contrite sorrow— the deepest penitence 



s 

for our nalbnal and individual sins — (he most devout suppli- 
cation that this wrath may be stayed, and thai tin's bereave- 
ment may be sanctified for our national and individual benefit. 
It should be the place of deep and prayerful icflection, that we 
may act wisely, and be prepared in a measure to open our 
hearts to the counsels of wisdom which we need in this trying 
hour. 

And what, among other things, should be the appropriate 
subjects for consideration in that chamber in which we hide 
ourselves from the impending wrath ? We should reflect upon 
the character and attributes of that Sovereign God, in whose 
presence " the nations of the earth are as the small dust upon 
the scales of the balance;" before whom the people "are as 
grass-hoppers." What is human greatness, when contrasted 
with the Ruler of the world? What is man whose breath is 
in his nostrils, that he should stand before him and endure? — 
What are stations of human power and authority in his pres- 
ence, who holds the sceptre of universal dominion, and whose 
Kingdom is everlasting? W T hat is human life, or wisdom, or 
experience with Him, who before the mountains were brought, 
forth, or ever the earth or the world were formed, from ever- 
lasting to everlasting was God? What are human plans and 
counsels and purposes with him, who is above all and over all, 
God blessed forever. From this event, in this place of solemn 
retirement, " the still small voice" enters our inmost souls, and 
with subduing, overwhelming majesty, proclaims that "God 
alone is great ?" " He giveth not account of any of his matters ; 
— his counsel shall stand, and He will do all his pleasure." — 
" Who by searching can find out God ; or being his counsellor, 
hath taught Him." " Who is of purer eyes than to behold in- 
iquity, and who cannot look upon sin." That chamber of re- 
fuge should bring that Being— his character and his attributes, 
—his sovereignty and his purposes— his purity and his holines, 
in connection with these events — with ourselves and our sins — 
our thoughtlessness and ingratitude— our hopes and our fears, 
and we may then perhaps, see the only way in which the worst 
may be avoided, and the desired result may be realized. Oh ! 
that my unhappy, bleeding country, could this day lay her 
throbbing heart before God ! For there alone can her gaping 
wounds be healed. 

There ive should reflect with the deepest humility and contri- 
tion, upon the character and extent of the calamity which has 
befallen us. Reflection here is above all things indispensible. 
Without it, we shall fail to realize our critical condition and 
take the onlv available course to remedy the evil. Without it 



we shall bo left to grow harder in sin, until God moves out ot 
his place to punish the inhabitants of our land for their iniquity. 

To lose a good man, is always to a greater or less degree, 
a national affliction. It reduces the number of those', who are 
the pillars of the State, and the firm supporters of order and 
good fellowship in society. To lose a good Ruler, is always a 
great national calamity ; but to lose such a man at such a crisis ! 
The loss is incalculable ! But once before in the history of our 
Republic, has this event occurred. Then there were compar- 
atively no great events pending — no distractions — no threaten- 
ed internal ruptures. Then there were but heart burnings and 
jealousies. Then those firery words had not been spoken— 
nor had those fierce denunciations been attered ; yef men start- 
ed and turned pale. The veteran of fourscore years wept like 
a child at his country's loss, and youth stood mute with aston- 
ishment ! But now — how is it now ? You whose time and 
occupation lead you to a more intimate acquaintance with po- 
litical events, tell me, how is it now ? With what words shall 
I describe the probable loss to the country in the death of him 
who held, as the earthly instrument, the helm of our Nation's 
destinies, and who had manifested such an indomitable resolu- 
tion to preserve her freedom and her integrity inviolate ? Has 
not our glorious' Union been threatened — denounced? Have 
not those unhappy words been spoken by American citizens? 
By the Representatives of a great and free people? Has not 
that been assailed most unsparingly, which was dear to us as 
the apple of our eye — the very mention of which in an unfriend- 
ly manner, we regarded as treason against our most precious 
hopes? The heart of the Nation has stood still, to see the 
champions of mind meet upon the floor of Congress, in fierce 
combat for freedom and the Union on the one side, and slavery 
at all hazards, on the other ! Humiliating, disastrous contest! 
Those words can never be unsaid ; those records can never be 
obliterated ; those bleeding wounds can never be probed and 
healed as though they had not been. Now parties rage and 
sections are arrayed against each other. Now the " house is 
divided against itself." Shall we appeal to the Divine Teach- 
er to decide whether it can stand or not? The vaulting am- 
bition to obtain territory has been gratified. Upon that terri- 
tory, fierce contests were fought to secure its possession ; and 
now a fiercer conflict is raging to decide the question, whether 
human slavery shall, or shall not pollute its air, and blast the 
sinews of its strength. The God of mammon has been propi- 
tious—more than propitious. To him his votaries have bowed 



10 

down n with all the devotion of an Eastern idolatry."" The God 
of Heaven has been forgotten, and he has justly sent confusion 
into the councils of the Nation and relaxed the bonds of her 
strength. The defender of her integrity and her rights, lies 
in state, cold in the embrace of death. He has done with plans 
and schemes. His voice will be heard no more over those wild 
billows of sectional feuds and party strifes. His arm is power- 
less to hold the helm that guides and defends the hopes and 
blessings of present and future ages. Alas! my bereaved fel- 
low-citizens, you have met with an incalculable loss ! A ca- 
lamity which words cannot well define ? And what gives 
point to our justly excited fears, is, that he who is now gone — • 
our departed President, had assumed a position before the A- 
merican people, upon those questions that now divide the Na- 
tion, which no other man can maintain with the same degree 
of efficiency and acceptance with that section and interest of 
the Union, which he represents. His head can devise no more, 
nor can his heart carry out its noble schemes of sacrifices and 
concessions for the sake of peace. That a successor is provi- 
ded, and that he is a good man and true, we this day make de- 
vout thanksgiving to God. But what changes must result ? — 
Cabinets are dissolved. Counsellors of State are changed. — 
New elements are brought into the alrea^ fermenting mar, 1 :! ; 
and from the wreck of what there was, w 
the combination of new and more deadly e 
beloved Union, the heavens brood darkly ! Thick clouds nro 
gathering fast — in awful pomp our God has come, and our days 
of joy may be past; and the event which we mourn, and the 
voice of God in the event — our hopes and fears say to you — 
" Come my people, enter thou into thy chambers and shut thy 
doors about thee ; hide thyself as it were for a little moment, 
until the indignation be over past." 

There is another subject which that chamber of solemn re- 
flection should urge, and does urge upon the hearts and con- 
sciences of men, with prodigious power. A subject which I 
would fain pass over in silence, could I thus consider my du- 
ty done. That subject is, the rebuke ivhich is administered 
to the party spirit, ivhich has become so fearfully predominant 
in the administration oj our political affairs. How in a mo- 
ment are the plans, the hopes, the purposes of a party, chang- 
ed—crushed by the Providence of God all that for which they 
schemed and contrived and labored and sacrificed for months, 
for years, is brought to nought in a single moment. Success, 
without regard to the means employed to obtain it, or the prin- 
ciples or the men selected to secure it, is now the one sole aim 



11 

of political parties. God, right, truth, justice, all are iurg^. 
ten in the intemperate zeal to triumph and hold the stations of* 
influence and power in the Slate. How do men canvass and 
organize and martial their forces and intrigue and plot to ac- 
complish their end. The curse of God is upon it, and has 
been for the last ten years of our political history, as legibly 
written as were those mysterious words upon the palace walls 
of Babylon's King. Brethren, I hold no connection or affinity 
with any political party in existence ; and what I say, I firmly 
believe to be as fully applicable to one political party as it is 
to the other. It is the bane, the curse of Republicanism — the 
plague spot that rusts and eats out its strength and destroys 
its life. Look at its legitimate results. It corrupts the purity 
of political institutions and defeats the very end for which pow- 
er was given to the people. It is the embodiment of injustice 
and cruelty. A man is no sooner selected as the choice of the 
majority of the people to fill the noblest office in their gift, than 
he is anathematized and devoted to political destruction from 
one end of the land to the other. Every act that he performs, is 
misconstrued, ridiculed, derided, and he himself is tortured, 
tormented, stung, until life becomes a burden. That a man's 
acts in such a station should be narrowly watched and freely 
commented upon, is both natural and right, but that he should. 
be thus abused and taunted merely for political purposes, is at 
once barbarous and wicked in the extreme — a sin that cries to 
high heaven for vengeance upon its perpetrators. The ruler 
is the servant of God, whatever may be his personal or indi- 
vidual character. In his official relation, there have been com- 
mitted to him high and solemn trusts which he holds in behalf 
of those governed, as the representative of a higher power, 
and he who called him to that station will defend his preroga- 
tives or avenge his wrongs. That noble old hero whose re- 
mains were but yesterday hung over in inexpressible grief by 
the citizens of the Capitol of our nation, never knew what 
hardship was, until he took his seat as President of the United 
States. He had braved the malaria of the southern ever- 
glades — he had breasted the savage in fierce combat undaunted 
and unhurt — he had faced the death-bearing shot of iron and 
lead upon the field of carnage unscathed — but he had never 
been tortured and vexed and plagued and defamed by hun- 
dreds and thousands of the people, whom he came to serve ; 
and upon his own death-bed, he felt that his vexations and 
mental anxieties and the lacerations which his heart had en- 
dured, had done more to destroy him than physical disease.— 
My Brethren, I do not believe that the man lives, who cau 



12 

pass, under the existing stale of political parties, a single Pres- 
idential term and not come out a perfect wreck. How was it 
with the predecessor of him who has just gone to his rest. I 
refer to President Polk, that noble minded man whose virtues 
and high endowments all acknowledge — whose character was 
so symetrical, so beautiful, who brought to that, station, a mind 
and a body full of vigor and youth and of vast resources and 
immolated them upon the altar of his country's good. He left 
his place, the shadow of what he was, to sink into a premature 
grave. How was it with that poor old man that preceded 
him — whose name was shouted by the multitude, and borne 
in triumph to that lofty seat and hurled from it again in fiercer 
denunciations, by a popular clamor equally as great. It has 
now become a matter of history that his martyrdom lasted just 
one month ! And in this connection, it is a most significant 
fact, that for an office that lasts but for four years, and which 
has never been held but for twice that length of time, there 
should now be living but a single individual that had been elect- 
ed to it by the people. It has become, almost without any fig- 
ure of speech, " that bourne from whence no traveler returns." 
Is it not a most significant fact, bearing with it a most thrilling 
reproof — manifesting most conclusively that God's judgments 
ere abroad in the land, and that his hand is upon the place of 
power, to hurl from thence all that man places there, without 
recognizing his sovereign prerogative? Political partizan, 
pause ! Enter into thy chamber and shut thy doors about thee. 
It is time to reflect seriously. Events so marked bring with 
them their own peculiar lesson. Look over the history of the 
past, the feelings, the motives, the influences which have com- 
bined together and brought about the present stale of things. 
See the evils which threaten us and the causes which have 
produced them. Pause here— upon that brink to which, to 
all human appearances, the Providence of God has brought 
upon us ? 

Can any thing be done to arrest these evils — to pass the cri- 
sis in safety — to shun the rock upon which we are in such im- 
minent danger of being wrecked, and again reach the open sea 
of prosperity and increasing glory ? We believe there may. — 
Not by Legislatures and Senates — but by the humble disciples 
of Jesus Christ, in their contrite supplications before the Great 
Ruler of the world — not by the Representative upon the floor 
of Congress, but by the Constituent in his chamber of solemn 
reflection — not by the man of the mighty intellect, \tfho seizes 
upon the passions of his audience with the grasp of a giant and 
drags them to the very borders of treason and anarchy, but by 



the sorrow of the humble heart that trembles at God's word ; 
whose mental conceptions may be few and feeble; but who 
has the power t: to move the arm that moves the world." We 
have seen too much of man — too much of his plans and ma- 
chinery and contriving. It is time that he hides himself for a 
little —that he disappears from the stage of action, until the 
just indignation of Him that doeth his pleasure in the armies of 
Heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth, be overpast. 

That we may realise our true posilion and estimate onr real 
character in his sight, he has baptised our Nation in grief, and 
bathed it with tears. May we deplore our sins, and with the 
remains of our departed Ruler, bury our animosities and offer 
with one heart the prayer : — 

Our Fathei's God, lo Thee, 
Author of Liberty — 

To Thee we sing : 
Long; may out land be bright. 
With Freedom's holy light. 
Protected by thy might. 

Great God our King. 



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